POSTS WITH TAG: vaccines

Baby This Just In

The Best Way to Soothe Your Crying Infant

Posted by April Peveteaux
on Apr 16, 2012 at 3:45 PM

happiest baby on the block painI can't even remember which friend it was, but someone passed down their used copy of Dr. Harvey Karp's The Happiest Baby on the Block DVD shortly before my first baby was born. It's ridiculous that I can't recall who gave it to me, as I would love to thank them five million times over for the relief that was provided when I followed Karp's 5 S's: swaddling, side/stomach position, shushing, swinging, and sucking. My gal would chill out and, indeed, be the happiest baby on the block (see pic).

So it's not surprising, to me anyway, that Pediatrics has come out with a study showing that Karp's methods are scientifically proven to soothe babies who have just received a vaccination. Those are crying babies who just got jabbed. So not an easy crowd.

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Big Kid Rant

Vaccine-Friendly Parents Are the Best Thing for Unvaccinated Kids

Posted by Jeanne Sager
on Feb 28, 2012 at 2:35 PM

vaccineThere's nothing like a good vaccine debate to end a mommy friendship. But a fight brewing at a school in Billings, Montana over an HPV vaccine clinic is a good reminder to the anti-vax crowd that they can disagree with us ... but boy do they need us.

Tabatha Pearson claims the Gardasil vaccine caused her elder daughter's infertility. It's a rumored side effect that hasn't been supported by any investigation by the Centers for Disease Control, but OK, fair enough, she's a concerned mom looking out for her own kids. That makes sense.

What doesn't make sense? Pearson is trying to shut down a clinic that would provide a life-saving vaccine for other fifth and sixth graders in her local community at a fraction of the cost.

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Baby Heartbreaking

Baby's Near-Death From Whooping Cough Is Why Moms Should Vaccinate

Posted by Mary Fischer
on Feb 10, 2012 at 5:05 PM

Seeing a baby hooked up to oxygen and feeding tubes is totally and completely gut-wrenching for any parent. And as I sat today and watched a news clip about a 4-month-old baby named Everlee who almost died after a bout with whooping cough, I couldn't help but feel my stomach sink a bit. Whooping cough is an "old disease" that we are suddenly hearing about again because more and more parents are refusing to vaccinate their kids. And that's just scary.

Poor little Everlee was just a few weeks shy of receiving her shot against the disease. But a child who was likely un-vaccinated at her 9-year-old sister's school happened to contract whooping cough before that, and the sister likely brought it home on her clothing because of how contagious the disease is, which is how doctors think Everlee probably caught it. And then she wound up in the intensive care unit fighting for her life.

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Baby

Parents Who Refuse Vaccines for Kids Baffle Me

Posted by Amy Keyishian
on Oct 24, 2011 at 2:02 PM

Vaccination and Climate ChangeThis was one of those Tweets that just sprang, fully-formed, from my imagination: “At a certain point,” I said, “climate-change deniers and vaccination refusers start to look the same.” It went straight to my Facebook, and slowly, quietly, people began contacting me to say they agreed and were baffled by the phenomenon.

When did it become fashionable to be ignorant? When did we decide that science was stupid?

Hey, I’m all for questioning authority and rising up against oppression and all that. Raising our voices to effect change. But I believe in being well-informed, which is why I like science: nothing is proven 'til it shows up in a double-blind experiment. I live in an extremely wealthy, progressive, left-wing enclave that is notable for having drastically dropping rates of immunization. The richer the neighborhood, the fancier the private schools, the more likely the kids will be unprotected from polio, mumps, measles, and rubella.

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Baby

Horrifying Ingredient Found in Vaccines Could Make Some Stop

Posted by Christie Haskell
on Sep 7, 2011 at 10:03 AM

Guess what's floating around in vaccines? Cellophane. No, this isn't another of those "aborted fetal tissue, pig parts, space rocks" rants about how you're poisoning your kids and must be stupid if you don't know what's in them. But there are some freaky things in vaccines that are intentionally included. This one happens to be an accident though, or at least just poor processing.

Charred cellophane was found in some vaccines by Merck, and the FDA says it's the fault of the plant that makes the vaccines. It looks like this is hardly a surprise either, based on previous findings in past inspections. Yikes.

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Baby

One Important Vaccine You Should Not Chicken Out On

Posted by Amy Keyishian
on Aug 1, 2011 at 1:47 PM
Back to School - Kids' Health

Chicken Pox BlistersI know that I, for one, kind of went “buh?” when I heard there was a chicken pox vaccine. Unlike polio and German measles, I thought it was a harmless inconvenience. Did I love sitting in the bathtub with an oatmeal-filled sock as my skin oozed and I missed days of my beloved B’nai Or nursery school? No. But it was over in a flash, it seemed.

Except that for 100 kids each year, chicken pox actually used to prove fatal. I know -- that kind of blows my mind. And I say “used to” because child deaths from chicken pox have decreased by 97 percent since the vaccine was brought into general use 12 years ago.

Wow. Very few deaths is great, but almost none is even better. Absolutely, I'll get that vaccine for my kid.

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Baby

Avoiding Vax Just Makes You Superstitious

Posted by Amy Keyishian
on Jul 14, 2011 at 9:30 AM

child getting VaccinationWhen I wrote about how life-saving breastfeeding is sometimes avoided in third-world countries because of superstitions, I compared that to moms here in the U.S. and other first-world countries who avoid life-saving immunizations because they have misinformed ideas about vaccinations.

Well, the comments came thick and fast. Many were furious at me for making that comparison, but I stand by my statement. And here’s why.

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Baby

Frightening News Might Convince Non-Vaxers to Vaccinate

Posted by Jacqueline Burt
on May 26, 2011 at 2:05 PM

measles babyIf you're a new mom struggling with the decision of whether or not to vaccinate your baby, I can sympathize -- I agonized over the choice when my first child was born almost 10 years ago. That was when mercury = autism rumors were running high, and I was terrified of what the MMR (measles, mumps, and rubella vaccine) might do to my daughter (since then, the initial study linking vaccines to autism has been called a fraud).

But the news that measles cases in the U.S. are at their highest in 15 years makes me glad I listened to my pediatrician and went ahead with the vaccinations.

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Toddler

New Vaccine Approved For Toddlers & Babies

Posted by April Peveteaux
on Apr 26, 2011 at 8:30 PM

new vaccine for babies toddlersGet ready to line up on the pro- and anti-vaccine side of the debate, as a new vaccine has been approved by the FDA for infants and toddlers. Menactra, a vaccine used to prevent meningitis for people ages 2 to 55 is now approved for babies as young as nine months.

Meningitis is especially scary as it can be difficult to diagnosis in babies and toddlers. The symptoms are stiff neck (how can you ask a pre-talker if his neck feels stiff?), high fever, and headache. Meningitis can also turn deadly in 15% of those who fall ill, even with treatment. It's a serious disease that we should all work to keep at bay. But some people are automatically suspicious of vaccines, no matter how much good they do, and how many lives are saved. You know who you are. 

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Baby

Some Kids Really Should Skip Certain Vaccines

Posted by Christie Haskell
on Apr 18, 2011 at 4:55 PM

As a middle ground vaccine mom, who does almost all vaccinations, but on a delayed schedule, I often find that not only do moms who feel like me make up a good number of moms, but we also have a tendency to get ignored in debates. Plus we get insulted by both sides. Oh goody.

One of the vaccine topics I'd like to debate is the one about how all kids should be vaccinated. For those who say they should, I'll ask, "Have you ever read the inserts?" But the better question might even be, "Has your doctor offered you the inserts?" Maybe not.

Getting "all the vaccines" isn't nearly as simple as people think. In fact, there are many vaccines that children of many different types shouldn't get ... as written by the manufacturer themselves.

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